During Superbowl XXXVII, FedEx ran a commercial that spoofed the movie “Castaway.” In that movie Tom Hanks played a FedEx worker whose company plane went down, stranding him on a desert island for years. There he meagerly survived on raw fish, roots and an odd assortment of barely useable junk from the plane.
There was only one “surviving” FedEx package. He kept it, and faithfully delivered it to the addressee when he was rescued from the island. (Sorry to spoil the movie if you’ve not seen it.)
Looking like the bedraggled Hanks in the movie, the FedEx employee in the commercial stumbles up to the door of a suburban home, package in hand.
When the lady of the house answers, he tells her his sad survival story, and how he preserved her package just for this day of delivery. She simply says: "Thanks."
As she turns away anti-climactically he can’t stand it any longer. He shouts: “I have to know what’s in that package!”
She opens it and shows him the contents, saying: "Oh, nothing really. Just a satellite telephone, a global positioning device, a compass, a water purifier, some matches and some seeds."*
Read Mark’s Gospel during this Advent season. In it we find many who DID treasure Jesus Christ, and many who did not, even though He was right under their noses.
Some were too familiar with Him to treasure Him (His own hometown, chapter 6). Others wanted Him only for what He could do for them (1:32-34). When they didn’t need Him, they didn’t treasure Him. The demons believed in Him, but they didn’t treasure Him (1:23-25, 32-34). James points out the emptiness of just believing in Jesus without loving and following Him (James 2:19). These kinds of folks are not given life through Him.
What stands in your way to truly treasuring Christ? What would change that?
“God has given us eternal life, and this life is in his Son. He who has [treasures] the Son has life; he who does not have the Son does not have life” (I John 5:11-12).
*Source: Bill White, Paramount, California, PreachingToday.com
